Lead
by fireweed15
Summary: Vignettes detailing how, exactly, breaking up a hypercattle rustling could go wrong, and how the marshal and his companion deal with that.
1. Prologue

Of all the things they dealt with, hypercattle rustlers were perhaps the easiest to dispatch—to the degree that it had hardly been five minutes before Sparks and Croach had them on the run.

They couldn't be sure if it was complacency that got them, or just bad luck, but all the same—neither of them could have anticipated anything like… this.

"So long, Sparks Nevada!" As the rustlers hightailed toward the horizon, a gleaming silver canister arced through the air—directly towards them, its beeping becoming more insistent as it counted down to detonation.

As soon as it touched solid ground, the flash and bang knocked both the marshal and the tracker back, kicking up red dust. Croach was the first to recover, his head lifting slowly and his antennae twitching as his various senses recovered. Aside from sore and a little rattled, he was uninjured, and in spite of their distressed hums, the hypercattle were uninjured, as well.

He pushed himself up and dusted as much of the soil from his clothes as possible. "Sparks Nevada?"

"Croach?" As the dust settled, he was able to catch sight of the marshal—kneeling, doubled over his hands clamped almost protectively over his eyes.

"What happened?" He dropped into a crouch in front of him, catching him by the arm and moving to pull him upright; the human didn't budge. "Sparks Nevada, what happened?"

"Got me good—" The words came through clenched teeth. "Bastards got me good—" He winced sharply, then swore. "Fuck—"

"Let me see." Croach's hands gripped Sparks' wrists. "Let me see what happened."

With great reluctance, Sparks lowered his hands and lifted his face, now flushed pink. His pupils were wide, the typically deep brown irises little more than a thin ring. After a moment, they both came to the same realization, that despite their proximity and looking right at one another—"Croach I can't see—"

Despite the desert heat, the words were met with an almost ominous chill in the air. The tracker released Sparks' hands before reaching around his neck, loosening his bandanna. "This will likely cause you discomfort," he warned, folding it into a thin strip before moving to re-tie it over Sparks' eyes, "but it will protect your eyes from the sun."

Discomfort seemed to be an understatement, if the groans the marshal tried (and failed) to bite back were any indication. No words were exchanged—Croach too focused on rendering whatever first aid, both human and Martian, he could, and Sparks in too much pain to be capable of conversation.

As if by wordless command, Mercury trotted over to the pair, nosing his master's shoulder. If Sparks noticed it, he didn't acknowledge it. Croach offered the horse a scratch on the muzzle before heaving Sparks to his feet. He followed without resistance, and after some awkward direction (and more than a fair bit of pained curses), he was in the saddle once more.

Having no other options, Croach wrapped Mercury's reins loosely around his hand and started guiding the horse and its rider through the desert.


	2. Town

It was the longest ride either of them had ever known.

"We are on the outskirts of town, Sparks Nevada," Croach announced. It was the first thing he'd said in close to an hour.

"Take me home, Croach," Sparks requested.

The tracker made a soft, almost undignified sputter of surprise, his antennae twitching, before looking over his shoulder at Sparks. "You need medical attention," he stressed. "We will seek assistance from the human desig—"

"Yeah—let's just parade my blind ass down Main Street." The words were short, but dripping with venom, and the air around them was still and silent. "Croach…" His voice was softer now, the tone easily mistaken for vulnerable (which was, of course, impossible for a human like Sparks Nevada). "Take me home, and get the doc to come to me. Deal?"

He nodded slowly, accepting the proposal, before prompting Mercury forward once more. "This will relieve some of my onus to you."

"Yeah, I figured it would."


	3. Prognosis

"It's bad, but it's not permanent."

Croach leaned forward slightly from his perch on the end of the kitchen chair. Rarely was the small kitchen in the marshal's home so full—and perhaps it said something that the designation of "full" referred to himself, Sparks Nevada and the town's doctor.

Sparks' fingers drummed a staccato rhythm on the table. "Great, so how 'not permanent' is it?" he pressed.

"If'n you keep these glasses on much as possible and don't do anything too reckless—" The doctor laid a pair of dark-lensed spectacles near the marshal's drumming fingers and started returning their tools to their black bag—"two weeks at the outside."

The drumming on the table stopped as he threw his hands in the air. "What the hell am I supposed to do for two weeks?" he groused.

"I'd suggest starting with letting your eyes recover, Marshal." With a brief nod to both of them, the doctor was out the door.

"Yeah, that ain't happening," Sparks announced, standing and batting aside the glasses with a flick of his wrist.

"What are you doing?" Croach asked, rising with him.

"Going upstairs to salvage what remains of my dignity," he replied, nudging the chair back into place with his foot.

"Do you require assistance?" There were few stairs—but given the circumstances, enough for them to be potentially cumbersome, if not dangerous.

"I can handle a flight of stairs, Croach." Despite his confident tone, there was no denying the almost awkward way his hand sought the edge of the table, using the furniture as a guide to turn and make his way, slowly, across the floor to the doorway and out of sight.

It was going to be a long two weeks…


	4. Floor Plans

Sparks emerged several hours later, his pride just as wounded as his retinas. The small house was still and quiet, making his slow steps down the hall, one hand against the wall and the other awkwardly extended in search of the stair's handrail, loud in comparison—and that was nothing compared to the disconcerting feeling of going down the steps…

As with everything that had gone wrong today, he managed—at least until he rounded a corner and found his path blocked. He caught himself, brow furrowing as he realized that it was the couch. "Croach, am I going crazy or did this get moved?"

The floorboards creaked as the tracker emerged from a different part of the house. "I have rearranged your floor plans to be more efficient," he announced, as if it were the plainest thing imaginable.

"...Why?" Why did he feel like this was going to be a miserable experience?

"To be more efficient, and to minimize injury during your convalescence."

Yep. Miserable experience on the horizon. "Okay—" Try as he might, there was no way to deny the irritation creeping into his voice. "Croach, I had the floor plan laid out exactly the way I wanted it. I knew where everything was—I have no idea what you did or where my furniture is anymore."

Croach made a soft noise of surprise, as if this thought never occurred to him, but recovered quickly. "I will explain—"

"No—I want my furniture moved back," he interrupted.

A brief pause, followed by—"This is an open plan. It is more efficient and will minimize—"

"Oh my god—" Sparks pinched the bridge of his nose, ignoring the bite of pain that followed. "I want it moved back—exactly how I had it, and how I know it, so I don't trip over it at three in the morning. Got it?"

There was a long pause, followed by soft footsteps across the floor and the scrape of furniture being moved. "Understood."


	5. Meal

Sparks tried not to feel like he'd been banished from the kitchen, but given the way he was repeatedly shooed from the area, it was hard to not feel anything but simmering annoyance at the banishment.

Finally, Croach announced (in the same dry tone of voice as on the trail) that the meal was ready. Sparks declined his offer of assistance to the table—he'd already decided that he'd be damned if he was going to accept either the use of a cane or the assistance of others—before moving to settle into a chair.

When he was relatively certain that Croach wasn't watching him, he ran his hands over the tabletop, mapping out his place setting. Glass within easy reach, fork, plate (whatever the tracker had made smelled good, at least), napkin—"Hey, uh… Croach?" His fingers drummed lightly on top of the napkin. "Think you forgot the knife."

"Your food is already cut," he replied, seating himself at what Sparks assumed was the opposite side of the table.

He picked up the fork and started to poke at the food in front of him. Sure enough, an as-yet-identified cut of meat had been cut into perfectly uniform pieces. Had he not been so goddamned offended, he would have found the gesture thoughtful. "Why do I feel like I'm three and my mother has to cut everything into little pieces?" he muttered, stabbing the fork into the meal a little more aggressively than was necessary.

"This is for convenience," Croach explained.

Sparks' grip on the fork tightened microscopically as he looked, unseeing, down at the plate. "Y'gonna fuckin' call me Noodle, too?" he grumbled.

This, the tracker apparently hadn't caught. "Hmm?"

"Nothin'." He didn't say anything more, up to and including the fact that he'd suddenly lost his appetite.


	6. Boiling Point

Nights on Mars were quiet and cool—being the kind of Martian who rarely slept, Croach was familiar with them.

He had been turning the events of the afternoon over in his mind for some time now. The satisfaction of onus was, to use the human designation, a "very big deal," not to be declared lightly, and deserving of careful thought.

He had almost reached a conclusion when the sounds of… he could only designate them as sounds of distress from down the hall—specifically, from Sparks Nevada's rooms.

As a general rule, they agreed to keep these parts of their shared accommodations separate; now was something of a personally ethical dilemma—was entering them now improper, given the circumstances (not the least of which their last conversation)? A second cry of distress answered the question for him, and he stepped into the hall, pausing outside the marshal's door. Following the appropriate human custom, he knocked twice before pushing the door open.

The room was dimly lit, but not so much that he couldn't observe. The marshal, despite being asleep, was in obvious distress. The situation left Croach feeling deeply conflicted—on the one hand, he was still uncertain if his onus to Sparks Nevada was fulfilled or not. On the other, it seemed almost… cruel to leave him to the mercy of whatever was tormenting his sleep.

Ultimately, he never had to make a decision one way or the other. Sparks sat upright, looking vaguely disoriented and breathing heavily.

Croach knocked again, this time to announce his presence. (Standing and watching in silence, especially when he couldn't be seen, seemed unusually cruel.) "What happened, Sparks Nevada?" It was a curious thing to ask, given that he knew exactly what happened and the fact that his tribe was known to not be capable of deceit. However, one could justify it as sparing the human's dignity.

Sparks directed his unseeing gaze toward the doorframe in which the tracker stood. "Croach. I, uh…" He rubbed the back of his neck. "I thought you were going back to your tribe."

"I am still considering it." A truth to balance everything.

Sparks nodded slowly before gesturing vaguely to the foot of the bed. "I know you're standin' there, you can… sit down if you want, I guess."

Croach stepped inside and settled, almost stiffly, on the edge of the bed. "I will do so for a brief time. What troubles you, Sparks Nevada?"

He huffed softly, averting his gaze for a moment. "Nightmares," he finally admitted. "Real bad. Kinda surprised me is all."

He nodded once, slowly, before verbally confirming that he was listening, as well. "Do you wish to discuss them?"

Spark's hesitated, running a hand through his hair before speaking. "Something… big was happening. I don't know what exactly it was, just that… we're talkin' life and death type stuff here. People are getting hurt and everything's getting destroyed—and there's me. Right in the middle of it." His hands clenched into tight fists amid the bedclothes for a moment. "Not doin' anything to stop it."

Croach nodded again. "This is the fourth most troubling description of a dream I have ever heard."

Sparks chuckled humorlessly at the quantification. "Imagine what it felt like to be in it."

"If you know it is not real, why does it trouble you so profoundly?"

It was a hell of a loaded question, but it deserved an answer—given that they were being honest and whatnot. "My job is to protect the people on this planet—knowing I can't do that is…" The silence hung heavy in the air between them.

"Your silence communicates that which your limited human emotions cannot express," Croach replied, the words cold but somehow sounding understanding.

"Thanks, Croach," Sparks mumbled.

They were silent for several minutes—Sparks picking at a loose thread he'd discovered on the blanket, Croach staring out the window. Finally, the latter broke the silence. "...We have known each other for many years, Sparks Nevada."

"Yeah, guess we have…" he agreed.

"Today was the first time I have heard you use a slur against my tribe," he noted, the words straightforward but with an undeniable undercurrent of pain.

"Yeah, I'm…" Sparks rubbed the back of his neck again, shame making the tops of his ears turn pink. "'m sorry I called you a blue-skin, Croach."

Croach looked down at his hands, thinking very carefully about his opinion on the subject and the words he wanted to use, before sighing (a habit he'd somehow picked up from his human companion but had yet to break himself of). "Your apology is accepted, Sparks Nevada. Your words came from a place of anger—I am aware that you respect myself and our friendship, and would not have said it otherwise."

"Thanks," he mumbled, relief obvious in his voice. After several moments, he spoke again, the relief long gone. "...Croach what if I'm blinded for good?"

"I do not think that will be the case," he replied.

"You think I can salvage…" He waved his hand vaguely in front of his face. "All this?"

"I believe that if you follow the instructions given to you," he began, "your recovery will be faster."

Sparks nodded slowly, going back to picking at the bedclothes. "…That includes wearin' the glasses, huh?" he murmured.

"It would be an adequate start," Croach confirmed.

"Guess that'll start tomorrow," he said slowly. "Listen, I'm beat, so—"

"I will leave you to return to your sleep cycle," the tracker replied, moving to stand.

"Croach—" Spark's hand slid along the quilt, patting awkwardly until he found Croach's, then slid his hand up to rest on his shoulder. "I've been… I've been a real jackass to you all week, and you've been nothin' but patient. Thank you."

There was something incredibly intimate about the gesture that transcended their numerous differences. Croach rested his hand on top of the marshal's for a moment before they withdrew their hands. "You are welcome, Sparks Nevada."


	7. Dreams

Nights on Mars were quiet and cool—being the kind of Martian who rarely slept, Croach was familiar with them.

He had been turning the events of the afternoon over in his mind for some time now. The satisfaction of onus was, to use the human designation, a "very big deal," not to be declared lightly, and deserving of careful thought.

He had almost reached a conclusion when the sounds of… he could only designate them as sounds of distress from down the hall—specifically, from Sparks Nevada's rooms.

As a general rule, they agreed to keep these parts of their shared accommodations separate; now was something of a personally ethical dilemma—was entering them now improper, given the circumstances (not the least of which their last conversation)? A second cry of distress answered the question for him, and he stepped into the hall, pausing outside the marshal's door. Following the appropriate human custom, he knocked twice before pushing the door open.

The room was dimly lit, but not so much that he couldn't observe. The marshal, despite being asleep, was in obvious distress. The situation left Croach feeling deeply conflicted—on the one hand, he was still uncertain if his onus to Sparks Nevada was fulfilled or not. On the other, it seemed almost… cruel to leave him to the mercy of whatever was tormenting his sleep.

Ultimately, he never had to make a decision one way or the other. Sparks sat upright, looking vaguely disoriented and breathing heavily.

Croach knocked again, this time to announce his presence. (Standing and watching in silence, especially when he couldn't be seen, seemed unusually cruel.) "What happened, Sparks Nevada?" It was a curious thing to ask, given that he knew exactly what happened and the fact that his tribe was known to not be capable of deceit. However, one could justify it as sparing the human's dignity.

Sparks directed his unseeing gaze toward the doorframe in which the tracker stood. "Croach. I, uh…" He rubbed the back of his neck. "I thought you were going back to your tribe."

"I am still considering it." A truth to balance everything.

Sparks nodded slowly before gesturing vaguely to the foot of the bed. "I know you're standin' there, you can… sit down if you want, I guess."

Croach stepped inside and settled, almost stiffly, on the edge of the bed. "I will do so for a brief time. What troubles you, Sparks Nevada?"

He huffed softly, averting his gaze for a moment. "Nightmares," he finally admitted. "Real bad. Kinda surprised me is all."

He nodded once, slowly, before verbally confirming that he was listening, as well. "Do you wish to discuss them?"

Spark's hesitated, running a hand through his hair before speaking. "Something… big was happening. I don't know what exactly it was, just that… we're talkin' life and death type stuff here. People are getting hurt and everything's getting destroyed—and there's me. Right in the middle of it." His hands clenched into tight fists amid the bedclothes for a moment. "Not doin' anything to stop it."

Croach nodded again. "This is the fourth most troubling description of a dream I have ever heard."

Sparks chuckled humorlessly at the quantification. "Imagine what it felt like to be in it."

"If you know it is not real, why does it trouble you so profoundly?"

It was a hell of a loaded question, but it deserved an answer—given that they were being honest and whatnot. "My job is to protect the people on this planet—knowing I can't do that is…" The silence hung heavy in the air between them.

"Your silence communicates that which your limited human emotions cannot express," Croach replied, the words cold but somehow sounding understanding.

"Thanks, Croach," Sparks mumbled.

They were silent for several minutes—Sparks picking at a loose thread he'd discovered on the blanket, Croach staring out the window. Finally, the latter broke the silence. "...We have known each other for many years, Sparks Nevada."

"Yeah, guess we have…" he agreed.

"Today was the first time I have heard you use a slur against my tribe," he noted, the words straightforward but with an undeniable undercurrent of pain.

"Yeah, I'm…" Sparks rubbed the back of his neck again, shame making the tops of his ears turn pink. "'m sorry I called you a blue-skin, Croach."

Croach looked down at his hands, thinking very carefully about his opinion on the subject and the words he wanted to use, before sighing (a habit he'd somehow picked up from his human companion but had yet to break himself of). "Your apology is accepted, Sparks Nevada. Your words came from a place of anger—I am aware that you respect myself and our friendship, and would not have said it otherwise."

"Thanks," he mumbled, relief obvious in his voice. After several moments, he spoke again, the relief long gone. "...Croach what if I'm blinded for good?"

"I do not think that will be the case," he replied.

"You think I can salvage…" He waved his hand vaguely in front of his face. "All this?"

"I believe that if you follow the instructions given to you," he began, "your recovery will be faster."

Sparks nodded slowly, going back to picking at the bedclothes. "…That includes wearin' the glasses, huh?" he murmured.

"It would be an adequate start," Croach confirmed.

"Guess that'll start tomorrow," he said slowly. "Listen, I'm beat, so—"

"I will leave you to return to your sleep cycle," the tracker replied, moving to stand.

"Croach—" Spark's hand slid along the quilt, patting awkwardly until he found Croach's, then slid his hand up to rest on his shoulder. "I've been… I've been a real jackass to you all week, and you've been nothin' but patient. Thank you."

There was something incredibly intimate about the gesture that transcended their numerous differences. Croach rested his hand on top of the marshal's for a moment before they withdrew their hands. "You are welcome, Sparks Nevada."


	8. Lead

By morning, Croach was relatively certain that the marshal would have forgotten about his intent to use the glasses, and wasn't entirely sure how to bring it up without bruising his ego. After some time, he could hear footsteps descending and entering the kitchen. "Mornin', Croach."

He glanced up, and for a moment was almost humanly grateful Sparks couldn't see him blink in surprise. As he'd promised last night, he had started wearing the glasses, the dark lenses translucent, effectively shielding his eyes from the bright Mars sun.

The silence that followed was short—but noticeable. "Is something wrong?" Sparks asked, fussing with a button on his shirtsleeve. "I don't look like a walking disaster, do I? Kinda takin' stabs in the dark about what I was putting on this morning."

"No—your appearance is aesthetically pleasing to several of my visual senses," he reassured.

Where normally, the marshal would have had a quip about how that comment would sound to someone who didn't know them as well as they did each other, he simply sat at the kitchen table, accepting the cup of coffee Croach placed in front of him. "The, uh…" He waved vaguely to the glasses protecting his eyes. "Not too off-puttin'?"

"Not at all," he replied.

For the first time since losing his vision, a smile touched Sparks' features, if only for a moment. "Thanks for the vote of confidence, buddy." He took a sip of coffee—a little bitter, but it was hot, at least. "So… I was plannin' on picking up some supplies from the general store. If you want to tag along for that."

Croach nodded in thought, but only briefly, given that the marshal couldn't see the gesture. "If 'tagging along' will decrease my onus to you, then I would like to do so."

Sparks nodded, moving to stand but pausing halfway out of his seat. "Wait, after the week we've had, you're still keeping track of onus?"

The resulting conversation about if onus applied in situations like this occupied them (with the exception of Croach pointing out where there were steps) until they arrived at the general store proper. From there, they naturally separated—Croach's voice was a soft undercurrent of the store's ambient noise and Sparks' own footsteps as he, very carefully, walked the length of the store, weaving (a little clumsily) between barrels and bins.

It was going really well, until—"Hey Croach?" God, why did his voice sound so loud?

Croach lifted his head from the growing list of supplies being added to the marshal's tab. He excused himself from the counter and crossed the store to stand in front of Sparks. "What is it, Sparks Nevada?"

He pushed the glasses up the bridge of his nose, his unseeing gaze directed slightly downward. "Look, I know I'm in the general store, but I don't know where I am, so uhh…"

"I can offer my assistance if you would like," he said, sensing everything the marshal's pride wouldn't let him say outright.

"All I need's an elbow to hold on to," Sparks replied.

Croach reached out and lightly bumped his hand against Sparks'. "If you would like I can assist you, Sparks Nevada," he proffered.

A very small, almost irrational part of Sparks was afraid of being taken by the hand like a child; feeling Croach's hand tap against his was nothing less than a blessing. His fingers' wrapped loosely around the tracker's wrist, then trailed up to grasp his arm just above the elbow. "Thanks, Croach."


	9. Tactile

It had taken time, but Sparks was coming to terms with the temporary loss of his vision. Acceptance of it, however, was limited only to the fact that it had happened, not to the circumstances themselves. He quickly found that the two words that best described this part of his recovery were "long" and "boring."

Coach noticed it, too—it was difficult not to, given the vaguely melancholy air about the marshal now that he had accepted what had happened.

The melancholy had been going on for a few days when Croach deposited a heavy-sounding burden on the table in front of Sparks. "I have brought you something I believe will relieve your despondency and lack of activity," he announced.

Sparks' brow furrowed as he pulled the glasses from his face, glancing in the tracker's general direction. "What is it?"

"Among my tribe—" The scrape of a chair as he pulled it close to sit next to him—"there is a script that provides tactile feedback. It's purpose is to be read in extremely bright light, but I believe this modification will be helpful."

"That's great," Sparks replied, "but… what's gettin' modified?"

Croach pushed the object closer to him. "I have asked some of the members of my tribe who are familiar with this script to transcribe copies of your human literature."

"You're…" He paused, reaching in front of him to feel what it was—a stack of manuscripts, hastily bound, but undeniably books. "You're translating my books into Martian Braille?"

"It is a raised script unique to my tribe," Croach repeated—then, after a moment of thought, "but it is analogous to that which humans designate Braille."

Sparks ran his fingers over the cover. Rather than Braille cells or Martian characters, the letters were from the Latin alphabet, embossed—and amazingly, some of them actually made sense, forming small or half-spelled out words. The concept of his own literacy made tangible under his fingertips made his throat tighten in the best way possible. "Wow, Croach… this is really somethin'. Thank you…"

Croach murmured something in his native language that Sparks always assumed meant something like you're welcome. They sat in silence for several minutes before the human spoke again. "Hey. How about we go sit outside and read some of this? If it's gonna take awhile to get my eyes back, I'm gonna need the practice."

The tracker stood, brushing the back of his hand against Sparks' arm, giving him the choice to accept or deny the guide. "That sounds most agreeable, Sparks Nevada."

He accepted the help, and the pair moved to sit on the porch, legs crossed and knees just shy of touching. The reading was slow at first, allowing Sparks time to familiarize himself with the new alphabet; however, his understanding of the print grew with each chapter, thanks in no small part to Croach's guidance, to the degree that they were able to alternate reading the chapters out loud.

It was unclear when the marshal's sight would return in full, but both were in agreement that really, there were worse ways to pass the time.


End file.
